Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook (L) shoots against Denver Nuggets guard Evan Fournier in the first half of their NBA basketball game in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma January 16, 2013. REUTERS/Bill Waugh

Denver Nuggets center JaVale McGee, right, dunks the ball in front of Oklahoma City Thunder's Hasheem Thabeet, left, during the first quarter of an NBA basketball game in Oklahoma City, Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2013.

OKLAHOMA CITY — He’s one of those guys you either hate or you hate. He’s nasty and gnarly, jawing and clawing his way through a game. Russell Westbrook. He’s all grit, they’d say in Oklahoma City, all gall, they’d say in any other city.

But there he was Wednesday, hustling (russelling?) for 28 monster minutes. In the Thunder’s deluge of a win against Denver, 117-97, the point guard scored 32 points with four assists.

“Sometimes he attacked (our bigs), sometimes he shot the jumper, and he had a rhythm in both areas, very much just attacking us,” Nuggets coach George Karl said of Westbrook. “We never got control. … They were going after our pick-and-roll defense, and our big guys were always late.”

The Nuggets had won six consecutive games entering Wednesday, but had played an exhausting overtime game Tuesday in Denver. It showed.

This thing was over at halftime, when the Thunder led by 20 and Westbrook had 25 points. When his 28 minutes were up, Westbrook finished 12-for-20 from the field and 8-for-9 from the line. Even when Denver fouled him hard, like it did on one particular play in the paint, the cool customer composed his body somehow and still hit the floater during the foul.

The Nuggets’ leading scorer on the night was Kosta Koufos with 16. He would have been the fourth-highest scorer on the Thunder, which had Westbrook (32), Kevin Durant (20) and Kevin Martin (20).

And it wasn’t like Westbrook was doing it with a bunch of 3s (he only attempted one, which he missed). And it wasn’t like he was just making from a certain spot. Really, he made from all over — he was 4-for-6 from inside the paint, 4-for-7 from 8 to 16 feet and 4-for-6 from 16 to 23 feet.

Meanwhile, the Nuggets? Yikes. They couldn’t get anything going. It seemed like the Nuggets (24-17) were constantly just trying to keep up in all facets of the game. Danilo Gallinari and Andre Iguodala were clanking early and often.

“No excuses for how we came out and laid an egg tonight,” Nuggets guard Andre Miller said. “We rely on our running a lot, so anytime a team is putting up a lot of points and we have to take the ball out of the basket and get into an execution game, it’s not something we’re strong at doing. … The tempo was in their favor.”

Perhaps George Karl jinxed them. Before the game, the Nuggets coach gushed about his top players lately, in regard to their consistency. Well, besides Gallo and Dre, Ty Lawson had one of his worst games ever. With 9:43 left in the second (yes, second), he picked up his third foul. Ty finished with two points in 20 minutes with one assist and one rebound.

“The first play of the game, I tried to make sure he didn’t get an easy bucket,” Lawson said. “And then the second foul, I felt like I didn’t really foul him, but that’s how things go. I wanted to play through it, because I don’t foul that much, but coach took me out.”

Koufos was really the only bright spot, at least on offense. He made all six field-goal attempts, and collected nine rebounds too. JaVale McGee was also 5-for-6 from the field (15 points), but it would be a mistake to say the Nuggets dominated the paint. On the contrary, they had their moments.

But the Nuggets turned it over 21 times amid a smackdown (the Thunder scored 28 points off those turnovers). And Denver shot 2-for-15 from 3-point range, after making some key 3s the night before against Portland.

Nuggets Recap

What you might have missed. The Nuggets’ top eight players, in regard to minutes played, were minus-eight or worse. … The Thunder shot 47.4 percent from 3-point range (9- for-19). … Russell Westbrook scored 32 points in only 28 minutes in a follow-up to his 36 points in just 26 minutes at Phoenix two nights earlier.

Benjamin Hochman was a sports columnist for The Denver Post until August 2015 before leaving for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, his hometown newspaper. Hochman previously worked for the New Orleans Times-Picayune, winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for its Hurricane Katrina coverage. Hochman wrote the Katrina-themed book “Fourth and New Orleans,” published in 2007.

More in Sports

Broncos general manager John Elway was reminded of the nice weather, of the fun memories he had some 13 miles west in Palo Alto in college and of course the ones he experienced here in Santa Clara back in 2016.

A tangled mess at Coors Field unraveled early Thursday afternoon as rookie right-hander Jeff Hoffman craned his neck to see home run after home run leave the yard. Before the end, it devolved into a dilemma.